The situation was that this woman's mother married someone of Italian descent (not even a registered Italian) in 1952, then they divorced, then she married someone else and had children, including the person who posted (Gershon).

The LA consulate correctly recognized that Gershon's mother and Gershon are Italian citizens. (On a separate thread you can see that they were officially recognized a few months ago.) Moreover, when Gershon asked the Helsinki consulate in 2007, they gave completely wrong advice, saying that Gershon's mother was not a citizen. As you can see from the link, the LA consulate was "incredulous" that the Helsinki consulate didn't know the law.

If anyone here is suggesting that Italian consulates in the US DO know the law while Italian consulates in Europe do not, we must consider the case of my friend, an American born and raised in New York City. She married an Italian man in Italy, lived with him in Italy, gave birth to both of his children in Italy. She then returned to her home in New York City and divorced her Italian husband leaving her two children in Italy to be raised by their Italian father's family. Her ex-husband has since moved to New York City himself and remarried a second American woman. She, the second and CURRENT wife was recognized by the New York consulate as an Italian citizen through marriage. Even though the first wife goes to Italy twice a year to visit her Italian children and grand-children, the Italian Consulate in New York has steadfastly refused to recognize her as an Italian citizen and issue her an Italian passport due to the fact that she is divorced from her Italian husband and is not a resident of Italy, the place where the marriage took place. Therefore one simply cannot apply this Italian law broadly in every case and doing so gives false hope and MISINFORMATION to potential applicants. There are entirely too many variables, residency being one that is always considered.

What year did they marry and what year did they divorce? This makes an enormous difference.

If your friend was married before 1983 then she used to be an Italian, but may have lost it by the divorce, depending on when that was. However, the current wife would only have acquired her citizenship automatically if they had married prior to 1983. Otherwise she must've naturalized, or maybe she is of Italian descent. Without knowing the particulars we can't say if the NY consulate is correct or not.

I don't think anyone was making such a blanket statement about US vs European consulates. Ones in the US make mistakes all the time. To a certain extent it may depend on how many citizenship cases they see. The consulate in LA probably sees many more cases than the consulate in Helsinki. But it also depends on how experienced the individual handling the cases is. Someone who just started at LA may not be as knowledgeable as someone at Helsinki who used to work in the SF consulate.

I have been corresponding with several officers at the NY Consulate about my mother's case, [American woman married Italian man before 1983 and divorced him in 2005]. They have confirmed for me that under law 555/1912, art. 10, my mother did become a citizen when she married my father and can still apply for recognition at the NY Consulate despite now being divorced from him. The documents needed: Her b/c, my dad's Italian birth extract, their Italian marriage extract, and her US passport and a utility bill. We will also give them their divorce papers as well since those have not been sent to our comune in Italy yet.

A quick question for you AdrianBattaglia. If your mother is not descended from an Italian bloodline herself, why other than the fact that she may be entitled to recognition through marriage even though she is divorced, is she interested in obtaining Italian citizenship now? Does she have some special use planned for her Italian passport like moving to Italy, for example now or perhaps at retirement? I hope she's aware that Retirement outside of the USA in Italy or the European Union is indeed made very convenient for a person with an Italian passport and the lifestyle is nothing to complain about either. However, if the answer is no, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me for someone in your mother's position to become recognized at this point and that's why I'm asking.

This prompts me to bring up other situations I'm aware of where people "supposedly" recognized through marriage (two in particular) have failed to contribute anything whatsoever culturally or economically related to Italian citizenship but instead seem to spend all their time trolling the myriad of Italian citizenship websites lauding the superiority of the USA, despite it's very obvious decline in recent years -- and also reminding Italian-Americans, with subtle threats, of their responsibilities to the USA. Interestingly enough, even though Canada and Australia have Italian populations nearly as great as the USA, I haven't noticed Canadians or Australians reminding Italians from those countries of similar responsibilities.

At any rate, I personally can see right through this kind of façade. But I'd like to know if you or any other Italian-Americans interested in obtaining an Italian passport have there own opinions as to why someone who claims to be an Italian citizen might be interested in doing something like this? And if you haven't noticed it yet, perhaps in the pursuit of your and your mother's recognition, you will. For certain, when you go to your appointment at the New York Consulate, you won't get any reminders from the consulate personnel about your responsibilities to the USA. When you're in an Italian consulate, the only responsibilities you need be concerned with are Italy's.

Hi,I hope you don't mind if I piggyback onto this question. I asked this question on the italiancitizenship.freeforum.org board, and received an answer, but I'm really trying to understand the law behind all this.

Later this month, I have my appointment at the NY consulate. I am applying GF-F-Me, and I think I have a good shot at being recognized.

Both my father and grandfather are deceased now, but my mother is still alive.

My parents were married in 1966 in NYC and divorced in December, 1982. My mom went on to marry someone else.

Just to be clear, I'm asking this question because while I have an interest in acquiring a dual citizenship, my mother has NONE, and I don't want, through my actions to implicate anything at all about her. So I'm asking : as far as I know, she does not qualify for citizenship anyway. Is that correct? It occurred to me the other day, that I'm sending someone else's birth and marriage certificate over to Italy when I apply, and that gives me pause. In any case, if she wanted to apply, she'd need to do so herself, right?

I applied through my father's line, and he wanted no part of citizenship. No problem. His documents were registered to trace my line of descent, but only my son and I received citizenship recognition. No effect on him. And my father was entitled to citizenship if he had wanted it. No need to worry about your mom.

Ciao bff917, do not worry about any of your mother's personal documents being forwarded to Italy. They are given to the consulate but only the personal documents of the person actually recognized are forwarded to Italy and filed with the commune. I applied through my American born father and his personal documents are not on file in my commune. I know this because after I was recognized, I moved to Italy and have been living in my commune for 14 years.

As further confirmation, when my companion and I inquired about a 1948 case for his elder sibling who did not qualify jure sanguinis, we were told by Luigi Piano, an attorney in Italy that only the personal documents of recognized citizens are filed with the commune.

For example, if you became a recognized Italian citizen and then asked your commune to send you a copy of your mother's birth or marriage certificates, the commune would not be able to provide such a document. However, the documents you give to your consulate do stay on file with your consulate. Hope this helps allay your concerns.

In addition to what jennabet and mler said, I just want to point out that your mother lost the Italian citizenship she gained through marriage when she divorced in 1982, since the law didn't change until Apr 1983.

Good luck with your appointment if you haven't had it already, and if you did have it I hope it went well.

There has been a strong custom in Italy that determines how children are named:The first male is named after his paternal grandfather.The second male is named after his maternal grandfather.The first female is named after her paternal grandmother.The second female is named after her maternal grandmo...

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